What Is Part 2
by Willow-Bee the Cat
Summary: It made an odd sort of sense to Rose that it was Kakashi, not her father who followed her mother so soon afterward to the other side. Sequel to What Will Never Be and What Is Part 1


Disclaimer: I neither own nor make a profit from Harry Potter or Naruto.

Spoilers: Everything for both series.

Summary: It made an odd sort of sense to Rose that it was Kakashi, not her father who followed her mother so soon afterward to the other side.

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What Is Part 2

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One would think a simple notice-me-not would be too weak or too obvious to fool a group of shinobi for long, yet nobody so much as looked her way. Perhaps it was merely that they were so focused on the funeral service that they didn't notice her-Rose fought the urge to let out a snort. No, chances were they just had never encountered a notice-me-not before and had no idea of how to sense it, let alone counter it.

She sat upon a boulder, just to the side of the memorial stone, where she had both a view of all the mourners and of the large blonde man in a strange hat who gave Kakashi's eulogy. Arrayed around her-both on the bolder and upon the ground by her feet-was the pack of dogs which had served Kakashi so well for so long. Rose justified her presence there by telling herself she was there for the dogs-how else would they have attended-and not for her morbid curiosity which had led to her meeting the man four months prior. Her gaze landed upon Hiruzen-nor was she, she told herself, there because of the man who'd perhaps played the best game of shogi she'd won in a long time.

Eventually, the eulogy ended and people began to disperse. Rose wrapped her arms around her legs and rested her head on her knees and she watched, waiting for them all to leave.

When she'd summoned Pakkun to help her scout a cave system she was trying to navigate through two days prior-it was freelance work, but the treasure trove of scrolls she was searching for were worth it, though she'd no intention of ever selling them should she find them-the last thing Rose had expected was for Pakkun to tell her Kakashi was dead. Although she supposed it made an odd sort of sense to Rose that it was Kakashi who had followed her mother in death so soon after. They had only been fifty or so, not seventy or eighty, but it was a relatively common occurrence after the first half died for the second half of a couple to do so.

For a brief moment she thought of her father, then dismissed the thought. Ron and Hermione Weasley's marriage had been one of convenience, unlike Uncle Harry and Aunt Ginny's. Maybe Ron would have followed Harry into death, but not Hermione.

One by one, the dogs began to dismiss themselves until only Pakkun and Bull were left. Over the ten years she'd held the Dog Summoning Contract, Pakkun had become her friend, confidant, and advisor while Bull had become the protector she called for whenever she was in over her head-which happened surprisingly often. Rose might not actively go searching for trouble, but somehow she always got into the most… "interesting" of situations without trying.

"You look just like your mother," announced a male voice.

It took Rose a moment to realize the man was speaking to her, and even then, only because he stood before her. She looked up at him, taking in the green spandex most wizards would absolutely love and the bowl cut black hair.

Rose let the notice-me-not drop as she said, "And you look like Bruce Lee."

A melancholy smile crossed his face at that. "Rin-chan said the same thing to me, the first time we met."

The name Rin seemed familiar. And then she remembered Kakashi calling her mother that, all those years ago. "You knew Mom back when she was a-" The word felt alien, distasteful, so radically different from the woman her mother had pretended to be. "-kunoichi."

"I did," he said with a nod. "Rin-chan, Obito-kun and I were all in the same class at the Ninja Academy. I am Maito Gai, Rosie-chan."

"What was my mother like?" she asked. She'd only really seen the mask Hermione showed the world except on rare occasion.

Gai sat himself down on a nearby boulder. "Rin-chan was… unsuited for the life of a kunoichi. But her grandmother would hear of nothing else. She did well at the Academy, but when she was placed on her Genin team with Obito-kun and my eternal rival she… Rin-chan was the sweetest little girl, always willing to help anybody and everybody, and being expected to kill, to torture did something to her. If not for the war-the Third Great Shinobi War, I think Rin-chan would have been happy enough being a normal Genin and learning fuinjutsu from her sensei. But this was war and all Genin were on the front lines. She became an iryo nin for two reasons, I think; so that she knew how to heal her teammates when they were injured and because by that point iryo nin were protected. They were supposed to hang back and stay out of fights. They weren't sent on assassination missions-they were sent to heal the assassins."

Rosie tilted her head to the side. It was rumored that Hermione had assassinated scores of Death Eaters who had avoided prosecution, though nobody had ever been able to prove it. "That doesn't really sound like Mom. She and Dad and Uncle Harry spent most of the civil war on the front lines. If Mom hadn't wanted to she could have just stopped being friends with Uncle Harry and gone into hiding."

"My eternal rival, Kakashi, believed that Rin-chan just wanted to live a peaceful life and that she felt Hogwarts was her only chance of doing so. I don't know how being faced with another war effected her."

"How did-how did Kakashi-san die?"

"You have to understand that Kakashi wanted to die. He's wanted to die for a long time."

"Oh God," muttered Rose. Why had she pushed the man that way, taken her anger and grief out on him? "Was it my fault for telling him about Mom?"

Gai sighed, "It wasn't your fault. Kakashi was a genius; he became a Genin when he was five, a Chunin at six. He was used as a tool, an assassin until Yondaime-sama took him as an apprentice."

"Namikaze Minato, right?"

"Yes. Yondaime-sama spent years trying to remind Kakashi that he was human, that he was a child," explained Gai. "And he took on Obito-kun and your mother as students in his attempt to do so. Near the end, he seemed to get better. And then Obito died and your mother left and he began to revert back to being only a tool. He joined ANBU-the elite, black ops-but managed to stay grounded to some extent-until Yondaime-sama died. When he thought your mother died, a year later, he reverted back entirely, lost himself in being a tool. It's easy to do so, follow orders, don't feel, don't think. When he got out of ANBU he drifted until he got a Genin team. I did my best to keep him grounded, but it was those kids that made him actually want to live.

"But even then…" Gai shook his head. "Even then, he wasn't really living. Most active shinobi with careers like Kakashi don't live to see thirty, let alone fifty. I think finding out your mother was alive after all is why he survived the past twenty years. Though Rin-chan was only a shadow of what she'd once been, she was something to live for. And when she died, he let himself give up again, take suicide mission after suicide mission until somebody finally got lucky and killed him. Only this time, he wouldn't let me or Naruto-kun and Sakura-chan pull him out of it. It's not you're fault, Pakkun there would have told him of her death anyway."

"I said things to him that I shouldn't have."

"But they were things he needed to hear." Gai cleared his throat and pulled out a scroll. "My eternal rival left almost everything to you."

"What? Why?" said Rose, taking the scroll from him. It was, she noted, a scroll with items sealed into it. She was faintly familiar with the technique-most Wizarding used other options. Absently, she slipped the scroll into one of the many pouches on her belt. Nothing and nobody would be able to remove it from there without her permission.

"Kakashi never married or had children."

"Because he was waiting for Mom."

"He was very proud of your accomplishments, particularly that you became a fuinjutsu master," Gai nodded, then stood and struck a pose. "Come now, you should not loose yourself in grief. You are in the Springtime of your Youth, Rosie-chan!" Rosie could not help but giggle. He reminded her of some of the more eccentric wizards she'd met over the years. "Let us go and celebrate his life. And your mother's life."

"I know a good bar, not far from here."

"I could use a good drink," commented Pakkun as Bull rumbled his agreement.

Rose didn't quite know what to make of it when nobody so much as batted an eye when she ordered sake for Pakkun and Bull as well as herself and Gai. Then again, this was a shinobi village and they were probably used to odd things.

They were on their second bottle of sake when Hiruzen wandered into the bar. He stopped short, seemingly surprised at her appearance. Out of the corner of her eye, Rose noted Gai looking at Rose, then Hiruzen, and then a look of understanding crossed the man's face.

"Come, join us," Gai all but bellowed to Hiruzen. "We are celebrating my eternal rival and Rosie-chan's mother's lives."

"Oh?" Hiruzen sat down at the table, eyes falling on Pakkun and Bull, then widening. "Your mother?"

"Mom died four months ago, delivering that letter was her final request," she explained before downing half a bottle of sake.

"Rin-chan was one of Kakashi's Genin teammates."

"Mom retired absolutely ages ago," explained Rose.

"You two know each other?" asked Gai.

"He was kind enough to show me around last time I was in the village, and gave me one of the better games of shogi I've played this year."

"I still can't believe you won," he grumbled, serving himself some sake.

"What, do you want a rematch?" teased Rose.

Somewhere between their fourth and fifth shogi game Gai disappeared. Rose was relatively sure he said something about the youthful beauty of young love, but by that point they were both somewhat tipsy.


End file.
